Use the website below and your brains to answer the following questions.
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/evo_40
Verify you are on the right site by seeing the word “Speciation” and flies on a banana on the page.
Click on “Next” towards the bottom and right. You are using the site AND your knowledge gained from the class! NOT all
answers will be directly in the readings on the site!!
You should see little flies with hearts on them if you are in the right place!
1) What do the little hearts represent that is essential for individuals within a species to be able to do?
2) What does “macro” mean?
3) Why is studying species considered macro-evolutionary?
Click “Next”
4) 4. List any 3 unique phenotypes you can see from the spiders.
5) What explains how the same spider can have so many different phenotypes yet still be the same species of spider?
(Explain how we can have so much variation in the species!)
6) Since humans invented the term “species” what 2 things must interbreeding organisms be able to produce if in fact
they belong to the same species? (What 2 traits MUST their offspring have?)
7) Look at the crows, based on what you said in #6 above, how could you absolutely
confirm if the hybrid babies of the crow cross were a new species of just a phenotype
difference from the parents?
Click “Next”
8) When you see this diagram on the left, what do the different names (like “obscura”) what do you think that means or
represents?
9) How many different species of flies are represented on the diagram?
10) In the fruit fly story, why does disaster have to strike before speciation can occur?
11) What does “divergence” mean in the story?
12) Using the story, name 3 specific things/traits that change between the 2 separate fly populations.
13) Think back to the micro-evolutionary lecture and tell me what physical, actual thing in each group of flies has really
changed that results in changes to the different flies.
14) It says that even if the 2 groups end up back together again, they can’t interbreed offspring, why? What does the
author say is wrong with their offspring?
15) The other says “geographic isolation” is the pressure that caused the species to occur. Use any valid Google site to
provide a good definition for what “geographic isolation” and write it out.
16) Think back to the first Micro-evolution lecture, how did what you said in #15 above, impact Darwin? Be specific!
Click “Next”
17) The author explains the causes of speciation (the 2 bolded concepts) after reading this page, what happens first?
(Which of the bolded term happens before the other?)
18) In northern Arizona, there is a HUGE structure that acts like a physical barrier, separating small animals and plants.
Name it.
19) Why do we have to stop gene flow so that we can ultimately end with 2 distinct species?
20) Does the force that separates a population HAVE to be a physical barrier? In other words, does the barrier have to be
something we can actually see, touch, measure (like a large, deep river)?
21) What does “speciation events” mean?
Click “Next”
22) What does “incipient species” mean?
23) What does “allopatry” mean? Give an example.
24) The author describes 3 specific ways that we can stop gene flow between 2 groups, name them.
25) In the fly story, a storm separated the groups, but what ultimately pushed/drove their independent evolution? (Caused
their genetic change?)
26) If the population separates (diverges) because of habitat/resource usage and not an actual physical barrier it is called
“parapatric isolation”. Darwin saw this first hand in what type of animal?
27) So to summarize (MAKE SURE THIS IS CLEARLY IN YOUR NOTES!) speciation acts can occur if a population is
separated from a physical boundary or can be separated as the individuals in the population become highly adapted
(you eat seeds, I eat worms, you drink nectar and so on).
28) How can the Galapagos Islands and Darwin’s finches found on both a single islands and between distant islands be
an example of both types of speciation described above? Explain.
Click “Next”
29) Summarize Dodd’s experiments with the flies.
30) What was her conclusion?
31) What does her experiment have to do with speciation?
32) What causes the owls to become 2 separate species?
33) What evidence is there for what you said in #32 above?
You can log off of the website now.
Summarize your learning: (Use ALL your knowledge to answer these questions)
34) Define Macro-evolution.
35) We read that there must be “reproductive isolation” that occurs between members of the population. What does that
mean?
36) Which micro-evolutionary process is stopped when reproductive isolation happens?
37) What does “point of divergence” mean? (In terms of 2 species who share a common ancestor)
38) Not using examples from the Internet activity, give an example of something you think might be animal speciation.
39) If group A diverges into 2 new groups A and B, and each of these diverge and each of these diverges and then again,
each of these diverges, draw a tree like diagram to illustrate this scenario.
40) Based on your drawing and the info above, is there a common (shared) ancestor represented on your diagram? If so,
circle where you think it will be.
41) What do the micro-evolutionary processes have to do with macro-evolution?
42) In the simplest of terms, what does macro-evolutionary process actually deal with?
43) Complete this sentence: Over time, if a population becomes _________ isolated from each other, the _________ in
each population can undergo the mechanisms of micro-evolution until the point when even if they wanted to, they are
unable to produce ________ and or ________ offspring.